Simmons Cafe and Market opens in former general store

Tuesday

Jun 3, 2014 at 10:00 PM

Local, organic and sustainable foods are a specialty at new market, cafe.

Jennifer Marshall Grantham drove past the former F. A. Simmons Store in Little Compton for three to four years, all the while imaging a market, cafe and place for the community to gather in the Adamsville section of the seaside town.

“I couldn’t stop thinking about it,” she recalled last week as customers milled into the recently opened Simmons Cafe and Market.

The general store, which opened in 1922 at 78 Crandall Road, was for sale for about five years. And during that time, Grantham was busy with a job in the sustainable energy field, getting her master’s degree in managing for sustainability and having two kids. But none of that deterred Grantham from envisioning a new era for the cedar-shingled general store.

“Getting the master’s degree helped me build confidence to go for it. I would literally do class presentations on it,” she said.

Grantham and her husband Rupert bought the property and set about updating it a bit, while still keeping the character of the building. They knocked down a wall in the front room facing Crandall Road to open up the space, and they changed the lighting to CFL and LED to make it more environmentally friendly.

The cafe offers freshly made breakfasts — the egg, spinach, tomato, onion and cheese on an English muffin is Grantham’s favorite — soups of the day and salads, and sandwiches and paninis with an emphasis on healthy, natural ingredients. On this particular day the sandwich offerings included pork with sauteed apples, caramelized onions, red cabbage and spicy mustard; white bean pate with arugula, artichoke, tomatoes, onions and balsamic glaze; and a BLT with avocado all available on Provencal Bakery’s wheat bread, or sourdough.

While one side of the building is dedicated to the cafe, the market out front is part gift shop and part food store with a focus on sustainable and local.

“My favorite part of the store is this cooler; in a few weeks it will be stocked full of local produce,” she said of the case that was already brimming with lettuce greens, asparagus, kale and mushrooms from local farms supplied through the Farm Fresh Rhode Island network.

Another aspect of the market, is an emphasis on organic produce, such as potatoes and kale; and organic products such as grains, salsas, sauces and just about anything one would need to put together a meal.

Local meats from Beresford Farm in Tiverton, Round the Bend farm in Westport and Dufort Farm in Rehoboth and eggs from Helgar Farm in Tiverton are also available. Some of the other local products also include Bristol’s Wicked Natural mustards, ketchup and sauces, Provencal Bakery breads from Middletown, Brown Bear natural peanut butter from Providence and RI Rocks chocolate nuggets. “Of course, we also have local dairy,” she said as she listed some local dairy favorites, including Westport’s Shy Brother’s Cloumage, Arruda’s Dairy milk, and Narragansett Creamery cheeses and dips.

For those who like their dairy on the sweeter side — and in a cone or topped with hot fudge sauce — there’s also several varieties of ice cream handmade at Maple Valley Creamery in Hadley. They also make two varieties in-store: vanilla and chocolate.

Grantham, a native of Pennsylvania, moved to the area after graduating from Cornell University with a degree in natural resources and policy management. The first week she moved here she met her future husband, Rupert, and she fell in love with the area because of its unique character as a coastal community with a thriving agricultural component.

Over the past few months as she was working on the market/cafe, Grantham said realized she wants customers to think of it as “a year-round indoor farmer’s market where they can eat, buy local products and fresh veggies and gather with the local community seven days a week between 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.”

The local products don’t stop at the fare; there’s also a big selection of gifts and goodies from greeting cards and soaps to jewelry and artwork.

“All of the gifts in the shop are handmade within 100 miles,” she said. “The concept is sustainable with an emphasis on local. The money you spend every day supports our community.”